We'd normally write something mildly clever in this spot, but to be honest, it's been a long week and we're just too tired to be clever. So umm, a man walks into a bar. He says ouch. See what we mean? Anyway, have some of our favorite posts from the last week:
Help! Windows cannot open this file Ever download a shiny new file from the internet only to realize you have no idea how to open it, make it run, or do whatever it is it's supposed to do? We've compiled a roundup of some of the best Windows applications for opening pretty much any file type. Make sure to check out the comments, because it turns out y'all provided a veritable treasure trove of additional suggestions.
aTunes: Cross-platform open source media player Looking for a media player capable of handling pretty much anything you can throw at it (except DRM)? aTunes might just fit the bill. And it's open soruce and cross-platform to boot. There's a native Windows version, but since the application is Java based, you can also run it on OS X and Unix/Linux. Oh, and did we mention it displays lyrics and has a karaoke mode?
PlanningWiz: Plan and share room layouts Whether you're moving into a new place or trying to figure out how to better utilize the space you have, odds are PlanningWiz can save you an awful lot of time and graphing paper. This web-based app makes it easy to set your room dimensions and then start figuring out where to put the couch, table, entertainment system and missile silo.
Tofu makes on-screen reading actually bearable Computer monitors are a lot better than they used to be, but let's face it, even though we spend all day staring at a computer screen we have a hard time reading large amounts of text on a computer screen. That pretty much rules out reading eBooks. But Tofu is a desktop app for Mac that takes large chunks of text and breaks them up into shorter, more easily digestable segments so you can tackle War and Peace without all the eye strain.
Inline PDF viewing for Firefox 3? There's a plugin for that While the Safari web browser features support for inline PDF viewing, if you happen across a PDF online while using the Mac version of Firefox 3, you have two choices: download the PDF or install this plugin. Nuff said.
Sync your Google Reader, NewsGator feeds with RSS Bandit There's a new alpha version of RSS Bandit, a desktop RSS reader for Windows that adds one killer new feature: Support for synchronization with online feed readers like Google Reader and NewsGator. In other words, you can configure RSS Bandit to not only import your feed list, but to mark items as read in your online reader once you've read them using the desktop reader, or vice versa.
Remember back when the only software worth having was the kind that fit on a single floppy disk? NFReader would have fit right in. You know, if RSS and floppy disks had coexisted a bit longer. NFReader is an RSS reader for Windows that weighs in at less than 1MB. It also doesn't require installation, which makes it a perfect candidate for throwing on a USB flash drive.
You won't find a ton of features in NFReader. There's no way to tag, star, or share items. You can just mark articles as read or unread. But you do to choose whether you want to use HTML or just read the plain text versions of each article.
Like any good RSS Reader, NFReader will let you import or export OPML files. So if you typically use an online RSS reader like Google Reader or Bloglines, but want to test out a desktop reader, you can export your web-based feed list and import it in a matter of moments.
At first glance, the latest version of RSS Bandit looks just like pretty much every other desktop RSS reader for Windows. In other words, it looks like Outlook. But this week saw the released of RSS Bandit 1.7 Alpha with one killer new feature: support for synchronization with your Google Reader or NewsGator feeds.
Here's how it works. You download and install the open source application, and then click the File menu and select Synchronize Feeds. Pick your service and enter your login information and RSS Bandit will import your feed list in a matter of seconds. Any actions you take using the desktop reader should then be reflected at your online feed reader. You can mark items as reader, unread, or shared. And you can subscribe to feeds or remove feeds using RSS Bandit and the changes should apply to your online account.
At least that's the theory. In practice, we're still waiting for our changes to show up in Google Reader. We read a few items, unsubscribed from a feed, and over an hour later Google Reader is showing no sign that it's noticed. This is still Alpha software, so it's possible speedier updates could come at a later date.
RSS Bandit 1.7 Alpha also adds a new podcast download manager.
NewsGator, the company behind award-winning RSS readers FeedDemon, NetNewsWire and NewsGator Go!, has just released an update to its widget platform, in the form of Editor's Desk 2.1.
Editor's Desk is a web-based tool for creating widgets that can display dynamic content (using RSS) that can then be embedded into your website, Facebook page (as an app), Blogger, TypePad, NetVibes, iGoogle,Pageflakes, Live.com and Live Spaces.
Version 2.1 boasts an improved interface that is not only better looking, but easier to use. Version 2.1 has also added two new widget templates, a search tool (for premium subscribers), the ability to clone widgets and a way to monitor the feeds within your widgets for problems.
We played around with the new version of Editor's Desk and were impressed with how easy the whole creation process really was. To create a widget, you can either add your own RSS feeds or choose a collection of feeds from categories provided by NewsGator. The free version of the service only provides minimal customization options for your widgets, you can select from a set a templates and then modify some of the colors, but if you pay for the premium version of the service, you can customize the CSS and HTML of the widgets. Some companies like USA Today and The Discovery Channel have already done that with spectacular results.
At first glance, Toluu looks like a stripped down version of the RSS aggregator Fav.or.it, which we reviewed earlier, but it's not. They both serve the same purpose - recommending new feeds based on your current subscriptions. The difference lies in how each web site gets this done. To use Fav.or.it, you have to abandon your current RSS reader in order to benefit from their recommendations. On the other hand, Toluu works with your RSS reader, to make these recommendations.
Getting started couldn't be easier. Import the OPML file from your RSS reader and it instantly matches your feeds with other members who have similar taste. You can then discover and read new feeds directly in Toluu before deciding to subscribe.
Using the provided bookmarklet, you can add new feeds to Toluu - so you can continue to benefit from updated recommendations - and subscribe in your preferred reader simultaneously. Supported readers include Google Reader, My AOL and Netvibes, amongst others. You can also connect Toluu directly to Twitter, sending an update every time you add a new feed.
Toluu is currently in private beta and invites seemed to be going out pretty slowly, and while it's certainly worth the wait, we have invites for the first 100 readers to leave a comment below.
Update: We've got another 25 invites to give away. First come, first served!
Fav.or.it is a new kind of RSS aggregator, somewhere in between a pre-set collection of feeds like Alltop and a full-on Google Reader-style service. It had been in closed beta, but now's it's opening to everyone. It includes a set of 2000 of the most popular and interesting feeds, and provides recommended stories based on what you're reading, how long you spend on it, and how you rate it. Basically, Fav.or.it tries to pay attention to what you're paying attention to. Also, as we reported earlier, your comments show up in Fav.or.it and on the original story.
It's no reason to abandon Google Reader, but if you're not already reading RSS feeds, this is a good introduction to managing them. With it's Top-Story-focused, categorized startpage, it reminds us more of Google News than Google Reader in some ways. Whether Fav.or.it gets a good user base is going to be depend on how happy people are with its recommendation algorithm. Even if you just think of it as site that exposes newbies to a couple thousand top blogs, it's doing a useful service for the Internet.
Eluma has released a public beta version of its social RSS reader for Windows, which has been in private beta for the last few months. Eluma is basically a desktop application that lets you sift through RSS feeds and bookmarks.
You can also rate individual items with a thumbs up or down button or tag items to make them easier to find later, or share them online with other Eluma users. There are also browser toolbars for Firefox and Internet Explorer that let you add web pages or RSS feeds to Eluma with a single click.
The public version of Eluma has a few new features, including:
New local search feature for searching local data
Improved navigation of public web collections
Improved interface with new menus and desktop alert options
Support for Firefox 3 and 64 bit versions of Windows
if you're a fan of desktop RSS readers, Eluma might be worth checking out. One complaint we have is that here doesn't appear to be a way to view all of your unread items in a "river of news" format.
When Twitter users recently stumbled onto Plurk, it gained a big chunk of new users who like the interface, but want to remain active on Twitter as well. Now there's a solution, and it's called Feedtweeter. Right now, all it does is push your Plurks to Twitter, taking out any fancy formatting that wouldn't come across in a tweet. However, support is planned for feeding other services into Twitter, including Flickr, del.icio.us, and YouTube. Feedtweeter is currently in closed beta.
Plurking to Twitter is attractive because they're both the same type of service: microblogging. But even though something you write on Plurk might be perfect for Twitter, pushing every link you post on del.icio.us into a Twitter account might be, well, spam. We've seen this before with other services that post to Twitter via RSS feeds, and we don't really need another one of those. What's useful here is realizing that Plurks might have formatting issues that make them hard to feed into Twitter, and offering a solution to the issue.
Bringing together a group of people can be a pain. Facebook events and groups, eVites, emails, text messages, smoke signals.
Mobaganda aims to make the gathering process that much easier.
Simplicity seems to be the new h0t on the web, and we like it.
As soon as you visit Mobaganda, you'll notice that you don't have to sign up for anything. Say what? Useless you say! I HAVE to put in my username/pass somewhere!!!! Nope.
All you have to do is name the event and set the date and you're off!
As soon as you create the event, a unique page is created like this one. After 60 days, the pages go away, so no worries about URL's being gone forever.
People can RSVP on the page, and an RSS feed is immediately available to track which cool kids are coming.
Simple, easy, that's it.
Manage the mob with Mobaganda and spend your time on more important things, like grabbing the keg.
The question that a lot of people bring up when they're talking about open source extensions and plug-ins is that "What happens when a new version of X comes out, will my favorite plug-in for it work?"
In some cases, especially with Wordpress, unfortunately the answer is often No.
But Firefox has a dedicated community that does a really good job of porting over the most popular extensions to new versions of the browser. This makes not only the community strong, but the browser and the Firefox initiative itself stronger.
Sage is an extension that basically replicates a desktop RSS/Atom reader, but it's really lightweight and integrates with Firefox well. That's what Firefox does well. Seamless experience with software and the web.
The new version that works with Firefox 3 is called "Sage-Too". Kind of like Teen Wolf Too, but better. And with no wolves. And without Jason Bateman. He was great in Juno and Arrested Development, but Teen Wolf was not his shining moment.
We digress.
Here's a Sage-Two feature rundown:
Reads RSS (2.0, 1.0, 0.9x) and Atom feeds
Newspaper feed rendering customizable via style sheets
Feed Discovery
Integrates with Firefox's bookmark storage and Live Bookmarks
Support for a number of locales: Argentine Spanish, Catalan, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Slovenian, Spanish, and Swedish
How many of you subscribe to an RSS feed because you liked one post you read? Raise your hands please. No, seriously, raise your hands please. Now how many of you stay subscribed to that feed because you're either too lazy to unsubscribe, don't know how to unsubscribe, or don't want to hurt the bloggers' feelings by unsubscribing? Us too.
Using some Harry Potter magic sauce from a company called SenseArray, NewsGator will start showing you suggestions based on things that other people think are interesting. Hooray!
What's the catch? Well, to make this technology smarter, you'll have to interact with your feeds a little. That's OK. We know that the earth isn't run by Terminators machines...yet. Right now, SenseArray's technology uses forward and share numbers, as well as tags and comment data to calculate what might interest you. You'll be able to thumbs up and thumbs down stories to customize the experience though, so no worries. Rage against the machine, y'all!
Soon, NewsGator hopes to accurately predict your tastes, even before you know what your tastes are.
It looks like the company is also hoping to help us deal with our severe information overload (the 3% of us junkies) by letting us unsubscribe to those dormant feeds that we don't like anymore and keep us up to date with the Right Stuff. The stuff we'll actually, you know...read?
Oh, and no worries, it's not just for the geeks. Their new recommendation service will cover Top News, Entertainment, Sports, Fun Stuff, Science and Technology. While we're not sure what "Fun Stuff" actually is, we'll wait for T2 to suggest something.
Oh and please feel free to subscribe to the Downloadsquad feed. We're humans.
Now that a lot of people are spending as much time looking at their RSS readers as their web browsers or email clients, it's probably a good idea to give your reader an appearance you can live with. If you happen to use NetNewsWire, one of the most popular RSS apps for OS X, you've got plenty of stylesheets to choose from.
NetNewsWire supports CSS styles, so it's not too difficult to code your own if you happen to have some CSS experience. If you're a CSS newbie, though, don't sweat it: there are plenty of looks to choose from. We went beyond the preloaded styles and picked out some options that should please even the pickiest readers. Some of them not only change the look of NetNewsWire, but add some useful functionality as well. Take a look at our top 10 themes.
Snackr is an Adobe AIR-based RSS ticker that pulls random headlines from your RSS feeds and scrolls them along the bottom or the side of your screen, letting you click through to read anything that looks interesting. It's not a replacement for your regular RSS reader, but it makes a great supplement. Snackr's well worth checking out if you're an information addict who has to have the fire hydrant open at all times.
Because it's an AIR app, Snackr is cross-platform and sports a look that won't feel out of place on your OS. Ticker speed and position on screen are adjustable, and you can force the ticker on top of your other windows if it suits you. Snackr supports OPML files, so it's very easy to populate with the feeds of your choice. It also minimizes to a tiny tab when you want to put it away for a while, and shows a preview of each story you click on, instead of going directly to your browser. Snackr doesn't interrupt what you're doing unless you want it to.
All in all, this is one of the most useful, best-designed AIR apps we've seen yet. It's essential for heavy RSS users, or anyone who wants to stay on top of breaking news. Don't ditch your full-featured feed reader, by any means, but do supplement it with Snackr if you're looking for a faster, more dynamic way to consume information.
NewsGator has released an updated version of FeedDemon, the company's desktop RSS reader for Windows. FeedDemon 2.7 features a ton of bug fixes, a handful of new features, and best of all, it's still free. NewsGator used to charge for its desktop reader, but starting with FeedDemon 2.6 and NetNewsWire 3.1 for Mac the company started offering desktop clients for free.
Here are just a few of the changes in FeedDemon 2.7:
Quicker navigation of the subscription tree
Subscribe to multiple feeds at once from the "find feeds" menu
Copy a multi-line URL into the address bar and it will be shortened to one line
Support for multiple enclosures in a single post
Note that the FeedDemon home page still says the latest version is 2.6. But if you click the download link you should get FeedDemon 2.7.
Love Google Reader, but wish there was a desktop version of the RSS reader so you didn't have to open a web browser every time you want read your feeds? ReadAir is an Adobe AIR-based utility that lets you launch Google Reader as a standalone application. Since it's built on AIR, ReadAir runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux systems. Currently the program's default skin has an OS X look and feel, but the program will be skinnable in the future.
Overall, ReadAir does a pretty good job of making Google Reader feel like even more of a desktop application than it already does. But there's one major feature missing: keyboard shortcuts. We kept finding ourselves clicking J hoping we could view the next story without grabbing our mouse. But no dice. Future versions of ReadAir will include keyboard shortcuts and the ability to view more than 20 items per feed. And at that point it my actually be worth downloading and using ReadAir. For now it's pretty much a pretty proof of concept.
We'd normally write something mildly clever in this spot, but to be honest, it's been a long week and we're just too tired to be clever. So umm, a man walks into a bar. He says ouch. See what we mean? Anyway, have some of our favorite posts from the last week:
Bringing together a group of people can be a pain. Facebook events and groups, eVites, emails, text messages, smoke signals.
The question that a lot of people bring up when they're talking about open source extensions and plug-ins is that "What happens when a new version of X comes out, will my favorite plug-in for it work?"
How many of you subscribe to an RSS feed because you liked one post you read? Raise your hands please. No, seriously, raise your hands please. Now how many of you stay subscribed to that feed because you're either too lazy to unsubscribe, don't know how to unsubscribe, or don't want to hurt the bloggers' feelings by unsubscribing? Us too.
